Ankara, Turkey, August 25, 2013 – Eleven countries
booked their tickets to the second round (Round of 16) at the FIVB Men's U21
World Championship after a ground breaking fourth day of the pool preliminary
round held in both Ankara and Izmir on Sunday.

Turkey, India, China (Pool A), Iran, Argentina
(Pool B), Serbia, Canada, Tunisia (Pool C), Russia, France and Brazil (Pool D)
already secured their qualification with five more tickets to be decided on the
fifth and final day of the first round on Monday.

Host Turkey were the kings of the day after they
continued the victory rhythm over China 3-2 (21-25, 25-19, 21-25, 25-20, 15-6)
ending their pool A matches with the full mark with a run of 4 victories. India
who won an epic 3-1 (22-25, 25-21, 25-16, 25-16) against Egypt along with
China, joined Turkey to the round of 16 leaving on slot between Egypt and
Morocco to be decided in their face to face match on Monday.

Iran showed their power against Japan 3-0 (28-26,
29-27, 25-18) and will be joined by Argentina who went to a second win against
Mexico 3-0 (25-22, 25-14, 25-17) in Pool B leaving two tickets between Japan,
Mexico and Estonia to be decided on Monday.

Serbia topped Pool C with a third in raw win
against Canada 3-1 (23-25, 25-18, 25-16, 25-19), where the losers book their
ticket also along with Tunisia who upset USA 3-1 (25-23, 25-19, 16-25, 25-22).
Now the last ticket will be settled between USA and Rwanda.

Russia also made it 3-0 record in Pool D with a 3-1
victory (25-20, 25-16, 22-25, 25-19) against Venezuela to qualify with France
who took over Brazil in amazing tiebreaker 3-2 (25-23, 25-18, 17-25, 24-26,
16-14) joined by the latter losers leaving Italy and Venezuela to compete for
the last ticket.

The competition will be resumed with eight matches
in the fifth day of the preliminary round on Monday where the four preliminary
pools will be ranked from first to fifth. The bottom-ranked team of each pool
will play classification matches for 17th-20th place in a round-robin system.

The other 16 teams progress to the eight Finals
which consists of a playoff (first of Pool A against fourth of Pool B, second
of pool A against third of Pool B etc). The winners of the playoff matches will
advance to the quarterfinals, semifinals and finals to be classified from first
to eighth while the losers of playoff match will play classification matches,
with a similar quarterfinals, semifinals and finals system, to be classified
from ninth to sixteenth.

Pool A

India v Egypt 3-1 (22-25, 25-21,
25-16, 25-16)

India secured their place in the Round of 16 in
pool A match at Baskent Volleyball Hall in Ankara, the Asian side took the
three points against the team of Egypt with a final score of 3-1 (22-25, 25-21,
25-16, 25-16). With 6 points from two victories in the pool, India can no
longer fall beyond the third place in the final ranking. On the other
hand, Egypt will have to engage in a direct battle for survival with fellow
Africans from Morocco on Monday afternoon.

India showed a good blocking performance in this match with five of their 15
blocking points coming from the game’s top scorer Kumar Sinha Deepesh, who
tallied up a total of 18 points. Islam Abdelkader was Egypt’s most
prolific player with 12 points.

Turkey v China 3-2 (21-25, 25-19, 21-25, 25-20, 15-6)

Turkey finished unbeaten on top of the ranking in Pool A. With some
fantastic support from the home fans at Baskent Hall, the local heroes lost to
China their first two sets in the tournament, but went on to stay on their
winning path with a thrilling 3-2 (21-25, 25-19, 21-25, 25-20, 15-6)
victory. China will face India on Monday in a direct duel for the second
place.

What gave China the edge in an otherwise very competitive first set was their
incredible blocking performance. In the second set both teams showed excellent
blocking efforts, but China committed excessive errors. Productive
attacking on either side of the net provided for a high-quality third
set. This time China were the team that made fewer mistakes and managed
to claim the set. The Asian team continued to play well in blocking
during the fourth set, but not well enough to prevent Turkey’s spikers from
securing a tie-breaker fifth set. Inspired by the continuous support from
the Turkish fans on the stands, the players of coach Umit Hizal established
total control on the court and rushed to a convincing finish.

Gokhan Gokgoz piled up a total of 22 points (5 blocks) on his account of the
match to claim the top scoring position. Zhen Qin and Tingwei Yan scored
15 points each for China with Qin achieving seven of his by blocking.

Pool B

Argentina v Mexico 3-0 (25-22,
25-14, 25-17)

Argentina defeated Mexico by 3-0 (25-22, 25-14, 25-17) within a little over an
hour The Latin American clash was Sunday’s first match in Pool B.
The Argentines now have two victories and are well in contention to make it
successfully to the Round of 16, while the Mexicans have the difficult task to
beat Iran in order to secure their qualification without having to rely on a
possible victory of Argentina over Estonia

The first set was where the outcome of the match was actually decided.
The two teams played really well, but it was Argentina that reached the 25th
point first. This seemed to have been the end for Mexico in this
game. In the following two sets they could not stay competitive to their
opponents.

Pablo Koukartsev scored 13 points for the winning team to claim the top of the
match’s scorers’ table. Roberto Rincon settled for 9 points on his tally
to become Mexico’s best scorer of the game.

Iran v Japan 3-0 (28-26, 29-27, 25-18)

Iran continued their winning streak with a spectacular straight-set victory
over Japan. The two Asian teams played an exciting and competitive game,
in which coach Farhad Nafarzadeh’s squad persevered to defeat their opponents
by 3-0 (28-26, 29-27, 25-18) to stay on top of the pool ranking. Having
played all their four games in the pool, the Japanese now have to wait for the
match results on Monday to find out if they make it into the Round of 16.

Yuki Ishikawa’s 19 points for Japan made him the top scorer of the match.
With one point fewer, captain Javad Hosseinabadi was Iran’s most productive
player.

“We think that the first two sets were good, but the fact that we could not win
them disappointed us. Because of this, we partly gave up in the last set. We
were not in good condition, but we will do our best in the next matches.”
Japan's captain Masahiro Sekita said.

Iran's captain Javad Hosseinabadi commented: “We
played teams from three different continents so far. It was very difficult for
us because they all have different tactics and we need to change our play each
match. Japan are a team that plays very fast. We are very happy to win against
a very strong team like this.”

With the third victory in row the winners improved
their competition record to 3-0, while suffering their first defeat, Canada
dropped to 2-1.

Serbia's outstanding weapon Uros Kovacevic played
an important role in the victory, not only with his 23 points scored as the
match best scorer, but also with his motivations sent to his colleagues
specially when Canada led in the first set and also through the serving power
he made scoring two aces. The other outside hitter Mihajlo Stankovic was the
second scorer with 16 points.

Canada's Bradley Gunter, Stephen Maar and Ryley Barnes contributed 11 points
each as their side scorers in the epic encounter.

Eight Serbian ace services against 2 for the
Canadian side were the key factor to win the match beside the different
combinations for the winners led by the senior team promising star Aleksa
Brdjovic

Tunisia v USA 3-1 (25-23, 25-19,
16-25, 25-22)

Tunisia's organised reception and attacks paved the way to a 3-1 (25-23, 25-19,
16-25, 25-22) win over USA in Pool D epic encounter of the FIVB Men's U21 World
Championship at Ataturk Hall in Izmir, Turkey on Sunday.

Tunisia improved their tournament's win-loss ratio
in four matches to 2-2, while USA dropped to 1-2 in three matches and still
have one match in Pool C against neighbours Canada on Monday.

Outside hitters Malek Chekir and Elyes Garfi were
Tunisia's best scorers with 12 points each, while USA's spiker Michael Henchy
contributed 13 points for his team as best scorer.

Although Garfi changed his position from middle
blocker to outside hitter to replace the injured captain Ousama Mrika, he was
one of the match stars with his performance offensively and defensively.

Pool D

France v Brazil 3-2 (25-23,
25-18, 17-25, 24-26, 16-14)

The mighty France team upset No. 10 at FIVB Junior and Youth Ranking upset No.
5 Brazil in grueling face off 3-2 (25-23, 25-18, 17-25, 24-26, 16-14) in Pool
D. The match lasting more than two hours entertained the spectators with
fantastic volleyball skills providing a lot of thrills in what is described as
group of death.

France improved their win-loss at the end of their
group matches to 3-1, while Brazil dropped to 1-2 in three matches and still
have their last pool match against Venezuela on Monday.

The amazing French outside hitters Trevor Clevenot
and Thibault Rossard were the key factors in this victory as the first
contributed 22 points, while the latter scored impressive 21 points.

Brazil's opposite Alan Souza and middle blocker
Douglas Souza were both the scorers of their side with 14 points each.

France surprised the South Americans with a violent
start through organizing their net action as their reception was efficient,
something made them arrange well their attacks, while on the other hand Brazil
team committed a lot of reception and digging mistakes.

Russia overpower Venezuela with
service and defence

The powerful service and solid block served Russian team to overwhelm Venezuela
3-1 (25-20, 25-16, 22-25, 25-19) in Pool D. Russian coach Mikhail Nikolaev
started the match with the standing players and after he won the first set he
started to use the substitutes gradually till he used all the squad by the end
of the match.

Russian middle blocker Ilyas Kurkaev was his team
best scorer having a tally of 17 points including 5 killing blocks and 4 ace
services followed by Egor Feoktistov who scored 15, while one of the
competition best scorers Victor Poletaev contributed only 11.

From the Venezuelan side Roberth Abreu recorded 14
points followed by Willner Rivas who scored 11.